Chapter 125

Aria’s POV

“Don’t worry about it, Aria,” Liam said. “Did you want to talk about something?”

I had plenty that I wanted to talk about, more so now that I was so suspicious over whatever that phone call could have been. But, I had to press down on those personal feelings, at least for now.

William had to be my key focus here. His wellbeing remained priority one, even over my own personal feelings and worries.

“Yes. I think we should look into child psychologists for William. He’s been through a lot, and if today is anything to go by, he needs more help than what we can give him to help him move past the terrible things that Sophia has done to that boy.”

“I agree,” Liam said. “I trust you can handle that.”

Furrowing my brow, I gave him a flat look. “Liam, we should do this together as a family.”

“Right. Right, sorry.” He glanced back at where he’d left his phone on his desk.

“You’re distracted.”

“What?” He looked back at me with a start.

“If there is something going on, Liam, I want to know about it,” I said. “Because we are talking about our son, who has just today given us a tremendous scare, and you are acting like you have something more important going on.”

He cursed and dragged his hand down his face. “I’m sorry, Aria. You’re right. I don’t mean anything by it. Yes, that call was related to work. It’s big news…”

“What big news?”

“They aren’t just planning on expanding our team overseas. They want to do it here as well. You’ll start seeing construction around the office starting tomorrow. The executives want to double the size of our current building and bring in a bunch of new employees to match.”

“More drivers?” I asked. That was the only part that really affected me.

“Yes,” Liam said. “More everything.” Stress lines cut deep through the skin beside his eyes. With a sigh, he looked down at the ground, away from me. “I’m going to be busier moving forward. Most of the responsibilities of this new project are falling on my shoulders.”

That hardly seemed fair. “Surely they will bring someone in to help?”

“Most likely,” Liam said. “But I need to be the one to facilitate that. Until I can find someone capable, I don’t trust anyone but me to handle things.”

I didn’t much care for the idea of Liam overworking himself, especially given William’s fragile state. “William needs us both right now. If you are always busy, what will that mean for him?”

“I know that, Aria. Trust me, I’m trying my best.”

“I’m not trying to add pressure to your life,” I said, not liking the way he snapped at me. “But William needs his father. We can’t slack off on this.”

“I won’t. I swear I won’t. I can do this, Aria. I can run this team and still make time to be a father. I don’t care how much work they throw my way, or how many projects they load on top of me. I promise you, I will not forget my real priorities.”

I should believe him. He had proven so many times that he’d changed since we’d been together, but something about the way he made that promise, with the desperation in his voice, it took me straight back to this very room six years before.

I’ll do better, Aria. I promise.

He’d made and broken so many promises to me.

But this time, it was bigger than me and him. This time, kids were involved. If he broke his promises to them, it would be much more difficult to forgive him.

“Alright,” I said. “I’m holding you to that.”

Relief eased some of the edge off his face. “Please do. Hold me accountable. Tell me if I’m veering off course. I will listen to you this time, I promise.”

Another promise. Why did it sound as empty as the first?

For the rest of the week, Liam left for work before my alarm even started ringing. I’d thought, at first, that he might have in gone early so that he could be back to spend the evening with the kids and me. Yet, every night, he didn’t arrive home until after the kids had already gone to bed.

Still he went into their rooms to say goodnight, though the boys by then were already asleep.

On Thursday, William missed his dad so much that he resolved to stay up until Liam came home. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, no matter how hard I tried to coax him to go to bed. Honestly, I didn’t have much fight in me, though.

William needed his dad, and Liam had promised to be there.

With William waiting up on the couch, after nine, his eyelids growing heavy, I sneaked out into the kitchen to call Liam and let him know to hurry home. He didn’t answer my call so I left a quick message.

At ten, Liam still hadn’t come home. William, as hard as he did to try to stay awake, fell asleep on the couch. I turned off the television and placed a blanket over him, but didn’t take him to bed yet.

At ten thirty, Liam finally walked through the front door.

“Aria, you’re awake,” he said, surprised, as I approached him in the entryway.

“I am, though William tried.” Stepping back, I gestured toward the living room. He peeked inside, spotting William asleep on the couch. “Did you get my message? I tried to call you.”

“I didn’t even have time to look at my phone.” He sighed, full-bodied, with his shoulders slumping. “Let me carry him to bed and then we’ll talk a bit, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, because I had more than a few things I wanted to talk to him about. Mainly was the psychologists I’d narrowed down for William. The other was Liam’s schedule. I’d wanted us to go talk to someone together.

In the living room, Liam scooped William up into his arms. William rolled his head onto his dad’s shoulder but didn’t otherwise wake up.

Liam carried William upstairs, then returned a few minutes later without him.

By now, I was already sitting on the armed chair in the living room, waiting to have our discussion.

Liam sat down on the couch.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m all ears.”

“Well, I was thinking that…” No sooner had I started talking that I realized there was no need.

Liam had already fallen asleep.

God, he must have been so exhausted to collapse like that as soon as his body was in a position to relax.

I felt sorry for him, and yet… there were things we desperately needed to talk about.

I supposed it could all wait until the morning. This had been his latest evening home so far. Hopefully that meant he would have a slower morning tomorrow.

Grabbing the same blanket I had covered William with earlier, I now covered Liam. As he started to lightly snore, I turned off the lights and made my way back to my room.

In the morning, I turned off my alarm and headed into the living room, ready to talk to Liam.

He wasn’t there. Had he woken up in the night and gone to his actual bed?

Glancing out the window, I searched for his car, but didn’t see it.

He’d already gone into work again.